NYSAC Denies Holm’s UFC 208 Loss Appeal

UFC 208 was capped with a highly controversial main in event – after both the second and third rounds, Germaine de Randamie appeared to land punches after the bell. If referee Todd Anderson had deducted a point, the fight would have ended in a draw, and no inaugural women’s featherweight belt would have been awarded.

“After a review of the video footage of the bout, the New York State Athletic Commission determined that there was no clear error or violation of statute or rule by Referee Todd Anderson,” said an NYSAC official to Ariel Helwani for MMAFighting.com. “Therefore, the scoring and outcome of the bout will not be modified.”

Holm’s agent Lenny Fresquez responded.

“We respect their decision and will not seek anything further, except a rematch from Germaine,” he said.

Shortly before the official announcement, Holm appeared on The MMA Hour, and said she did not expect an positive outcome to her appeal.

“I’m not trying to be like a wuss about it and whine,” she said. “That’s definitely not what I’m trying to do. I think that’s a hard spot for me. A lot of people keep saying, well, she hit you after the bell, how do you feel? Well, I’m a fighter. I’m not going to sit here and whine about it and complain. There’s a lot of things I could have done.

“At least own it. She knows she did it on purpose and one of them definitely rocked me.”

De Randamie needs hand surgery and will likely fight either Holm or more likely Cris Cyborg in her first title defense. She is on record as saying she prefers Holm.

Highly passionate MMA Journalist, and I've followed the sport ever since my favorite fighter, Vitor Belfort won the heavyweight tournament at UFC 12. After that I've tried to go to every local MMA event around the Gulf Coast and surrounding areas and decided to make it a point to have a career in some aspect in the fighting sport other than fighting in general (didn't want to ruin my face). I'm currently enrolled at Southeastern Louisiana University working towards a degree in Communication. I cover MMA, Boxing and Football for The Daily Star newspaper in my hometown of Hammond, Louisiana, in addition to working as a promotional writer for a local Boxing promotion known as BoxnCar and I cover boxing for 8countnews.com however SciFighting.com is my home. My main goal is to bring more publicity to MMA in my area and to the sport as a whole as all of us involved with the sport are merely scratching the surface and laying the foundation of what mixed martial arts competition will be further down the road.

Leading the next generation of Sports Science reporting, SciFighting continues it's mission to bring a better understanding of martial arts, fight science, general health and fitness to both the professional athlete and the community at large.